As January has now technically come to an end, many manufacturers will be under increasing pressure to stick to their own self-imposed limits, for providing devices with Android 5.0 (Lollipop). Back when Google's latest android operating system was launched, many manufacturers were quick to state their intentions and let everybody know how quickly then were going to push Lollipop out. Unfortunately, good intentions are not always realistic intentions. With such a big upgrade from Android 4.4 (KitKat) to Android 5.0 (Lollipop), porting their devices over (and especially for those with heavier skins on top) was never going to be an easy task.

Yesterday, HTC were the first to officially announce they have fallen on their sword, by missing their ninety-day deadline to bring Lollipop to the HTC masses. They did try their hardest and a number of variants and regional versions of the HTC One M8 have started seeing Lollipop land. That said, not everyone will by the Feb 1st (the ninety-day) deadline date. Within the next couple of days, we will undoubtedly hear more manufacturers failing in a similar manner. Even if unlike HTC, they refuse to admit it. Of course, Samsung is probably the most watched manufacturer, when it comes to this update. Which is not that surprising when you consider that they are the biggest android manufacturer in the world. Not to mention that they have a whole plethora of devices, whose owners will be anxiously expecting the update. None more so though, than owners of the Samsung Galaxy Note 4.

The Note 4 is, after all, the current Samsung flagship device. Talk at the moment might all circulate the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S6, but right now, that is merely an afterthought. The Note 4 is only a couple of months old and is the current major Samsung device. Yet, as February turns up, Lollipop for the Note 4 is nowhere to be seen. It is now starting to become clear as to why. According to Faryaab (of Sammobile fame), the lack of an update for the Note 4 is due to the Samsung Gear VR. Yep, Samsung's virtual reality unit, is what is actually slowing down the update. This is apparently because the Note 4 needs specific tweaking to its kernel to ensure that after the update, it runs smoothly with the Gear VR. As this is currently the only device which is compatible with VR, Samsung has no choice but to wait until the tweaking is complete. Which by the way, seems to be in the hands of Oculus (the company behind the Gear VR). So, with that in mind, the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 seems almost certain to have to wait much longer for Lollipop to arrive.

John has been writing about and reviewing tech products since 2014 after making the transition from writing about and reviewing airlines. With a background in Psychology, John has a particular interest in the science and future of the industry. Besides adopting the Managing Editor role at AH John also covers much of the news surrounding audio and visual tech, including cord-cutting, the state of Pay-TV, and Android TV. Contact him at [email protected]